Martin Langan's blogs

Time is running out for Luddites

Martin Langan

Wednesday, 4 May 2011

This weekend saw some momentous failures in football refereeing decisions at the top of the Premier League, at a time when the climax to the season is being approached and much of the world is watching on television.

For those of you not interested in our national sport I won’t attempt to explain the issues, as it is enough to say that all four of the most significant errors were as clear as day to a watching TV audience.

But such evidence or other technological assistance was denied to the poor souls who have to officiate the game.

This ludicrous state of affairs was neatly put into context by James Lawton, Chief Sports Writer of The Independent, who said: 'The laws of football were first codified in 1863 or, put another way, before the American civil war was resolved, Leo Tolstoy published War and Peace and Mark Twain Huckleberry Finn, and, most relevantly, 63 years earlier than John Logie Baird provided the first demonstration of televised moving images.'

Legal practice has not been conducted in the glare of televised punditry, but there should be no doubt that this year’s opening up of the legal market will expose the folly of the Luddite tendency that still pervades the profession.

This is because existing and new entrants that make good use of the technology available to them now, and which is becoming smarter and more productive all the time, will inevitably drive down pricing so that those operating in their preferred time capsule will simply not be able to compete.

The public will not necessarily know that this is because of the failure to embrace technology, but will nonetheless regard the purveyors of bespoke legal services where they need not be bespoke, as out of touch, either in terms of cost, or the way in which services are delivered.

Many firms have understood this message and have invested well in IT, but even amongst those firms it is often the case that rejection of the changes in working practices demanded by judicious use of the technology is tolerated.

There are other firms who pay lip service by investing in systematization but only venturing timidly into the venture, not wanting systems to be 'too prescriptive' rather than asking themselves why expensive personnel should be performing a task that a computer can do perfectly well consistently.

It is unlikely that Jamie Redknapp will be dissecting your firm’s shortcomings on Sky Sports, but even if he were not doing so for football viewers, they can see with their own eyes what is wrong with the Dickensian way of ruling the game.

That which is not obvious now to lay observers of legal practice will become increasingly so in the months and years to come.

Unlike the world game, where everyone has to abide by the same rules, each firm can adopt and truly commit to modernising their services, and failure cannot be an option.

Martin Langan is a solicitor and founder of Legal Workflow Limited, providing services tailoring practice and case management systems and legal IT strategy and operational advice and assistance.

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It’s not all about the marketing

Martin Langan

Thursday, 13 January 2011

Here we are then, 2011, the year of the alternative business structure. If you don’t believe that implementation of the Legal Services Act will have a major impact on the legal market then don’t bother reading on, as nothing I can say will change your mind and neither will I attempt to do so.

There has understandably been a great deal of attention paid to the marketing power of the big brands that are sure to enter the legal services arena. Laudable marketing competition is emerging from the likes of Quality Solicitors and Wigster, but maximising marketing expenditure will not be enough to compete.

Some of the hyped big brands are also making the mistake of paying insufficient attention to the cost of production and I believe that other as yet unheralded players which understand the importance of this will enter the field. The equation for commercial success is fairly simple and admirably expressed in Alan Sugar’s autobiography, which found its way into my Christmas stocking. He wanted to know what his production costs had to be in order to sell his Amstrad products at a price attractive to the market, so he established this formula (which I have shortened for our purposes):

(Market price) – (Dealer’s margin) – (Amstrad’s gross margin) = Target cost price (including labour cost)

In our terms, we need to know what it should cost us to do work that will enable us to sell our services at a price that will be competitive even with the big brands and still achieve the profits that we aspire to. Once Amstrad knew that its target cost price should be it examined every component and processing cost with a view to meeting that target.

How many firms examine their costs of production? I venture to suggest that there are not many which pay sufficient regard to the importance of this. It is not just a question of producing management information about these costs, but having an operational strategy to lower them where they are found to be too high to achieve target cost price.

I can confidently guarantee that in most firms there is vast scope to lower production costs without sacrificing quality.This has at least two requirements: (1) devise an operational strategy and (2) insist on its delivery. Many of the firms that get something approaching the first requirement right then shy away from the second. It is no use spending money on IT systems but then allowing individuals to decide whether or not to use them. This is your firm and you are entitled to require not just suggest that the systems you put in place are adhered to.

Some imagination is needed when considering expenditure required to accommodate the above formula. It is not uncommon for a firm to baulk at IT expenditure where the one-off cost is less than the annual cost of employing one of the secretaries employed who would not be required if proper systems were put in place and used (or who could be put to fee-earning work if simple principles of delegation were employed).

None of this is rocket science, but law firms have not in the past had to pay too much attention to these basic business considerations. Partners and other law firm leaders should have been changing this attitude long before the year of the ABS and there might still be time to act before it really is too late. It is in our hands to make this not just a happy new year, but a happy new era.

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Hotel meetings and break clauses

Martin Langan

Thursday, 21 October 2010

I attended a meeting in a hotel lobby this week. As I entered the vast room, I was struck by just how many similar meetings were going on.

I’ve been doing business like this for some years now and there have always been plenty of others doing the same thing, but I haven’t witnessed quite such numbers other than in a conference environment.

These people were clearly not all part of one group. Everywhere there were earnest and convivial conversations going on as the participants leaned over laptops from comfortable armchairs and sofas. One of my companions was a high-flyer in commerce and I asked him if this really was a phenomenon that has arisen in relatively recent years, or was it always so outside the professions. He confirmed that technology has made all the difference to the numbers now conducting business in this way, so much so that hotels are specifically gearing up for this kind of trade, and often turn a greater profit per square foot of informal meeting space (even the formal meeting rooms are disappearing) than bedrooms, bars or restaurants.

The table turn is high and yet coffee, sandwiches and Wi-Fi access are consumed in sufficient quantities to deliver very healthy margins.

The hotel I attended was part of a chain and yet it was well appointed and an improvement on most offices I have ever worked in or visited. Free parking was plentiful and the whole experience was energising. Once over, my colleagues and I went our separate ways, all working from home as it happens.

This is not a trend that I can see being reversed. People are being freed from the constraints of working in one fixed place, and firms should at the very least be asking themselves whether they need as much office space as they currently occupy and whether there are opportunities to reduce rental and associated overheads and engage in a more flexible and, in my opinion, more enjoyable way of working.

I recommend a strategic review of all leases and a plan in place well before lease expiry and break dates, as once those dates pass, with new leases or further locked- in periods, the opportunity will be lost for several more years during which time the pace of change in technology may cause a largely office bound workforce to appear more and more anachronistic.

A shift in working patterns could also bring about changes in volumes of certain types of work. A shrinking market for office space would obviously impact on the volume of commercial property transactions as office space lies empty. Shortages of good housing stock could lead to office blocks being transformed into apartments, thereby rejuvenating the residential market. Strategic reviews may need to be far reaching…

Martin Langan is a solicitor and founder of Legal Workflow Limited

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Go for web services and automation but don’t forget your clients

Martin Langan

Tuesday, 28 September 2010

Forgive me for returning to this subject, but as we move into an era of providing services in new ways there are plenty of examples of how not to do it, from those who have had years of experience and who really ought to know better.

I firmly believe that web services will become the default method of delivery of legal services, and that clients will pay for a more traditional method of service only where it cannot be automated. There will doubtless be exceptions, but I refer here to general trends.

So far so good (or not, depending on your perspective). But there is a grave danger of destroying goodwill rather than enhancing it if you do not look after the client experience. Here is a little tale from my own recent experience, so recent in fact that I’m still peeling myself off the ceiling.

My anti-virus software is provided by a very well-known company. It has worked perfectly well for years and I have been very pleased with it. I renew each year automatically, although I can opt out of the automated renewal process. Updates are, as you would expect, online and automated and I don’t have to phone or write to anyone about the service; it is just there. I like it that way.

Last week, an automatic update caused a problem. A restart of my computer was required and this I duly did. Unfortunately, as soon as the computer started up again Windows informed me that I no longer had any anti-virus protection. I got straight onto the anti-virus company and, as my PC was exposed to online threats, I used the premium phone line rather than attempting email or chat.

My call was answered by someone who invited me to share my screen view and give him control of the computer so that he could explore the issue and fix it. I had the distinct impression that he was attending to several such jobs at the same time because he kept wandering away from the phone without telling me. To my increasing irritation he also avoided repeatedly answering my questions about his findings. After some five hours (thankfully not continuously but following a call back) he assured me that the problem was fixed.

The next day I found that in fact the problem was not fixed. My computer would restart without warning in the midst of my work with multiple files open. I am now on my fifth consecutive day of a cyclical process that is so routine that I know the script. It runs something like this:
1. I try to access customer service by email so that I can attach copies of chat logs etc, but the support by email button is inactive.
2. I select the chat option and I detail all that has already happened and quote all the previous support call references and ask the technician to read today’s story and the previous ones before doing anything.
3. The technician asks me lots of questions I have already answered and resolutely refuses to depart from this process. Irony in my responses is either ignored or simply lost on him.
4. I see on screen the technician bumbling around and covering the same ground that previous colleagues covered. My messages indicating that these steps have already been tried without success are ignored.
5. The technician assures me that the problem is fixed and the call is closed.

Today, I have had enough. I fight with the technician who is controlling the mouse and wrest back control of my computer. I ask that the matter be escalated to a higher authority and after resisting this at least half a dozen times I am told that someone will contact me after five hours. I ask for an email address to register a complaint. This is ignored. I keep on asking until I am eventually given a hyperlink and a phone number.

The hyperlink leads to the same site I started the process with. There is therefore no email support. I phone the number and am told that I can fax the company. I explain that I haven’t had a fax machine for years and I would like to email customer service. I am told to my astonishment that they do not have an email address so I will have to write a letter and post it. This is about the point at which I hit the ceiling.

I calm down a little and search the website for the word ‘complaint’ – it does not exist.

The moral in the tale is obvious and, no, sorry, it isn’t that one should not provide web services, it is that you can delight your clients by providing web services, but then lose all the goodwill that not only these services produced but any goodwill that your client previously had for you. And they will tell everyone they meet what a shower your firm is.

So do it, but do it right.

Martin Langan is a solicitor and founder of Legal Workflow Limited

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Solicitor comparison websites are an opportunity (though prices will fall)

Martin Langan

Thursday, 19 August 2010

The launch of the solicitors’ comparison website wigster.com, reported by the Gazette, is likely to engender polemic reaction from within the profession.

Many will see the site as another threat to contend with alongside ABSs, while others will view it as a means of fighting back.

But whichever side they take, no one though who has even casually considered the global market explosion over the last few decades, with added fuel from amazing advances in technology since the mid-1990s, can be surprised that these forces will now impact on the legal profession.

The lifting of the ban on solicitors’ advertising in 1987 was similarly polarising. I remember a district judge telling me that advertising was anathema to a profession, and that one would be rightly suspicious of any doctor who had to shout about his services in this way. Quite what that DJ would have made of the marketing of private medical services these days is not difficult to guess. Others welcomed the opportunity to compete openly on price, although usually proclaiming a high-quality service.

Conveyancing scale fees were abolished in 1972, but until the advertising ban was done away with, it was difficult for the public to compare prices. Even then, quality of work and service remained hard to differentiate, other than anecdotally.
Interestingly, wigster is part-owned by solicitors, perhaps as testament to the view that getting involved with the fight for market share is better than hand-wringing on the sidelines. In terms of public perception, a comparison website that scores firms on price, service and reputation could be of more interest than a Law Society campaign that seeks only to persuade people that solicitors in general are a good thing.

The kind of money that national TV coverage must cost is a sign that the profession can compete in marketing terms with the big companies that will surely emerge next year. Through this kind of initiative, solicitors can get a head start. This will inevitably mean a driving down of price, but there is no hiding place in an ever more transparent market.

If prices are to fall, then it is vital that firms look to the cost of production. That will mean a move away from outdated working practices that have no place in the modern world. Automation and delegation are key to survival. A repressed market has for too long enabled unjustifiably costly working methods to persist, and their days are surely numbered. The likes of wigster might just incentivise firms to act before it is too late.

Martin Langan is a former practising solicitor and founder of Legal Workflow Limited providing services tailoring practice and case management systems and legal IT strategy and operational advice and assistance

Exclusive: Legal price comparison site set to break new ground

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No way through the RTA portal

Martin Langan

Thursday, 3 June 2010

The MoJ RTA web portal continues to suffer from bad planning, implementation and a failure to consult. One legal software company has sent this communication to its clients: ‘We are pleased to announce that we can now provide Phase 1* ...

The MoJ RTA web portal continues to suffer from bad planning, implementation and a failure to consult. One legal software company has sent this communication to its clients: ‘We are pleased to announce that we can now provide Phase 1* of our solution which will allow IRIS Law Enterprise, IRIS Legal Office and IRIS Evolution users to integrate using the A2A (application to application) interface with the low value RTA claim portal.

“However, at this time, it is proving impossible for us to complete phases two and three, which would see further integration with the RTA Portal. The inability of the RTA portal team to either acknowledge or answer our queries regarding the A2A interface, coupled with the numerous problems already experienced with the implementation of the A2A interface itself, has meant we have no option but to cease any further development. We now plan to leave any further development until the portal team resolve the current known issues and failings, and until they can provide a timely support service to allow us to complete the work.

We have consulted with a number of clients who are heavily involved with the RTA Portal and we are pleased to know that they wholehearted support our decision.’

The portal was forced onto claimant solicitors with effect from 30 April. Despite the scandalously short notice period, and failure to provide sufficient information, many firms undertook a great deal of work at huge expense to ready themselves for launch, only to be badly let down by those who dreamed up the process in the first place.

This is not an isolated incident, where government, its agencies, or large commercial interests who seem to have great sway over government of whatever hue (block or two-tone) raise the hoops and require the profession to jump through them - only to pull away the prize on landing.

Any thought that ‘things can only get better’ with a change of administration has probably been dashed by announcements of cuts in IT expenditure.

Brave new world anyone?

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Time for a ‘meetings tsar’?

Martin Langan

Tuesday, 11 May 2010

One of the things I don’t miss since leaving partnership is the endless round of meetings. Partners’ meetings, departmental meetings, team meetings, one-to-one meetings, the list goes on. Were they all necessary? Did they always achieve something? Was action arising from the meetings always agreed? Was that action always taken? Was it always followed up? In all cases, the answer is sometimes and sometimes not.

I once attended, as an outsider, a meeting of partners and senior personnel which was to last a full day. I estimated that the cost of the meeting in terms of fee-earning opportunity was roughly £20,000; so I was hoping for great focus and dynamism, culminating in a number of resolutions that would be rigorously acted upon and followed up. Sadly, I was disappointed on all fronts. Even sadder, in my 26 years since qualifying as a solicitor, this was not an unusual occurrence.

I know of some firms where the meetings culture is so ingrained that it’s a wonder their lawyers ever find time to earn fees. Either that, or they struggle with ever-longer hours to keep up with chargeable hours targets, leading in many cases to disillusionment, de-motivation or departure.

I still have meetings of course, but in most cases my clients pay for my time, and this does tend to focus the mind on whether the meeting is really necessary and, if so, there is great interest in ensuring that the matters discussed at the meeting are acted upon and followed up.

This has caused me to wonder whether there is a place in firms for a kind of ‘meetings tsar’. In many firms, authority is required from a partner or other senior person for expenditure on marketing, training courses, books and so on. This helps control the budget, so why not do the same for meetings? In seeking authority, the applicant could be required to say what the meeting is for, whether it could be undertaken more efficiently by phone or video conference, who is to attend, what the role of each attendee would be, how much the meeting will cost in terms of fee-earning opportunity, what is the agenda, what are the objectives, and who will be responsible for ensuring that agreed points are followed up. There could be a report back on follow-up within an agreed time after the meeting, with a joint assessment by applicant and tsar as the value of the meeting.

You may think that old Langan has finally flipped his lid (if, indeed, you did not already reach that conclusion long ago). Am I seriously suggesting another layer of bureaucracy to a lot of red tape that might already be entwining the larger firms? Well, I admit that the solution might become another problem in itself. But if I have provoked some thought about tackling the drain on resources that meetings can be, then it will be worth the opprobrium.

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How does your firm manage online enquiries?

Martin Langan

Tuesday, 13 April 2010

When law firms first started to promote themselves online, their websites were little more than brochures: ‘This is who we are, this is where to find us and you can phone or email us for more information.’ Many firms have at least moved on to a more interactive experience for clients and potential clients, but for others the only advance has been to create an online form for an enquirer to complete by way of indicating their needs. I suggest that this does not really advance such firms’ offerings.

Nonetheless, such an online presence does get you noticed by prospective clients searching for a local solicitor, or a solicitor with a particular expertise. So it should go without saying that, when an enquiry from such a search is received, the firm must respond quickly to capture the enquirer as a client. After all, yours may well not be the only firm to whom an enquiry has been submitted.

Regular readers of my blog will be bracing themselves for a story about how law firms have failed to rise to this modest challenge, but on this occasion you can relax a little, because my anecdote is this time about accountancy firms. Don’t get too complacent though, because there may be a sting in this little tale.

I recently had cause to seek the services of an accountant, so I did some research and narrowed down my choice to three firms. All of them had online forms and I duly submitted my queries to each of them. Only one produced an automated email response advising me that I would hear from them within one working day, and they duly contacted me within that time. The second took two days to respond, and even then only after I emailed them to ask whether I might hear from them. As for the third, well, I’m still waiting six days later.

I suspect that, in the case of the firms that have been slow to respond, it was not a case of the person in receipt of the online form simply not being bothered. Or at least I hope so. It is more likely that they do not have a simple mechanism in place to ensure that all online expressions of interest are immediately routed to one or more persons tasked to respond immediately, with backup systems in place to deputise for absentees. This really isn’t rocket science and yet, in failing to have such systems in place, these firms have caused their reputations more damage than by not having a website in the first place.

The sting in the tale? Do you know how your firm manages online enquiries? When I ask partners in firms with management responsibilities, often they don’t know…

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Technology does not mean the dumbing down of professional services

Martin Langan

Tuesday, 30 March 2010

I occasionally hear lawyers bemoan the dumbing down of professional services, particularly where commoditisation is concerned. This has, in some quarters, become the equivalent of the well-worn knee-jerk term ‘political correctness gone mad’, a riposte to a changing world where old values are challenged and sometimes turned upside down. In like-minded company these phrases are met with sage head-nodding and much tut-tutting.

Now, I do not suggest that such reactions are always inappropriate, but I do object to the use of such labels without thought or perhaps by way of protectionism. No one likes to think that the work they have undertaken, or the way that it is performed, can now be done just as well, if not better, by a computer, but to deny this where it is patently true is not clever.

Failure to recognise the benefits of technology in the delivery of quality services by hanging on to bespoke working practices where they are not warranted will have uncomfortable consequences. Either clients will not pay for handcrafted work that they know only too well could have been commoditised, or the lawyer will have to restrict the charge for such work to the price it commands on a commoditised basis.

A residential conveyancing solicitor told me not long ago that he abhorred the use of case management systems in conveyancing and that his clients could spot a system-produced letter a mile off. His clients wanted only bespoke communications and they appreciated that he was providing such a service. This service was being delivered at a price more appropriate to a technology-backed service, so I asked him what level of profit he was achieving. A pause for thought was followed by the answer: ‘Probably none.’

A well-designed case management system should not produce impersonal and unspecific correspondence and documents, but that is beside the point. I suggest that eschewing the benefits of technology in favour of a craftsman approach where it is not warranted (and the emphasis is important) amounts to ‘dumbing up’ and perhaps that has become the new “dumbing down”.

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Change is happening quicker than you think

Martin Langan

Thursday, 18 February 2010

Outside of the personal injury claims world (and within it in many quarters) a highly significant change in legal practice is slipping in almost unnoticed. From 6 April this year, all personal injury claims arising from road traffic accidents, where the value of the claim is between £1,000 and £10,000, will have to be submitted and processed via a web portal funded and managed by the Association of British Insurers.

Strict time limits for responding to the claim, making offers of settlement and agreeing the same, or for submission to a district judge for assessment of quantum (which can be on the papers only) will be applied and fixed costs for each of the three stages of the process will be paid as each stage is completed. This is a gross over simplification of the process, but I want to give you the flavour.

Practitioners have been given scandalously short time to gear up for the structural and IT changes needed to be ready for the new system, not least because the regulations have not yet been published. This is very reminiscent of the lead up to the Woolf reforms, with regulations finalised only weeks before the implementation date, but at least on this occasion no one has had the temerity to choose April Fool’s Day again for the start date.

Leaving this gripe aside, the introduction of this process is, in my view, the biggest step yet in harnessing technology in shaping legal practice as predicted consistently by Professor Richard Susskind.

Although practitioners will be able to enter data manually on the portal, an interface will be available to enable case management databases held by firms to talk directly to the portal. Claims have to be formulated in a set way, with even medical reports required to comply with a template of required data.

Turnover of cases completed within this process will be much shorter than the current average and, although claimant solicitors will be paid less for their work, the entire process lends itself to delegation away from highly qualified staff for those parts of the job that do not warrant it, and computerisation where human input is unnecessary – that is if the claimant firm wants to make a profit.

The Ministry of Justice has not ruled out a future introduction of a computerised tool for assessing general damages, so not only will there be litigation conducted by one case management application talking to another, but the outcome itself could at some point be decided by computer.

It does not take a latter day Nostradamus to predict that this new process will pave the way for more cases to fall within its scope. Expect all road traffic fast-track claims to be embraced and for the regime to include claims arising from accidents at work and public liability claims. It is but a short step too to move into other areas of dispute resolution not involving personal injury claims.

Stop scanning the horizon to see what the future will bring. It is here. Now.

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